“Holy shit!” Mac exclaimed, his mouth hanging open. I stalked out sexily. I had practised for a few hours to try to walk in my new strappy black slutellos (my new word for slutty stilettos). I looked damned good. Sherry and I had spent two hours of shopping and bickering over everything. There had been a lot of pouting (me), a lot of tutting disapprovingly (Sherry), a few ‘I’m fucking walking here’ (me again), a big show down in the beauty aisle over ‘Why bronzer was an essential beauty item’ (Sherry pro, Me against). Eventually she had bribed me shamelessly with a few cold lagers if I just did what she wanted. She knew me so well, the little minx.

Sherry had chosen me a very tight and short dark purple bandana dress which suited my colouring. She had then very nicely blow dried and straightened my dark hair and done my face up for me. Even in my working days I had never bothered with slap. A little blush and some eye liner was all I was prepared to do on a night out. I could feel Mac’s eyes on my legs. It caused that slightly shivery feeling in my stomach but it also made me feel a little shy and self conscious.

‘Quick think of a joke! Say something funny!’ I thought furiously. I managed a weak, “There is nothing holy about this outfit” My confidence surged back as I saw his admiration. I decided to tease him with a, “I’m not even wearing underwear”. I wiggled past him while Sherry barely contained her laughter. His eyes roamed to see if I was telling the truth. I wiggled more and he made a half groaning sound.

He handed me four folders which were divided into each suspect or interviewee. I picked up Tony’s folder and started scanning. The anti-social Latvian had been very thorough. He had managed to get not only his adult arrest records but his sealed juvenile records too. What a piece of work! I felt a little sick. There were crime scene photos too. They hadn’t been able to pin anything on him but I could tell they knew he did it. Along with it a known list of associates including his mistress, her husband and a slew of thugs and underworld career criminals who I didn’t know. His bank statements were within the law but Kyrial had managed to get his hidden offshore ones. Tony had a nice little retirement nest egg in the Cayman Islands but it wasn’t enough to cover his missing money. No wonder he was panicking. His property portfolio though extensive was in his wife’s name so he couldn’t sell them. He had also provided a portfolio of rival gang leaders and other people jostling for power in the organisation. He had killed off most of them in a bloody gang war a few years ago. I remembered reading about some of these cases. His main rival and the only one not dead was a Jack Morris. From the notes the policeman had surmised that a truce was called between the power jostling gangs. Apparently they were losing too many Hench-people. Okay, I adlibbed there, he called them something boring like street soldiers but it sounded too Godfatherish again!

I looked at Mac, “What about this Jack Morris? If I wanted to get rid of my rival without a blood war, I’d take out my main competitor deviously”

“Yes, I have Kyrial working on getting his information for me,” he said smiling.

I then pulled out the folder entitled ‘Larry Epstein’. He was Tony’s account. He had a clean profile with only one arrest record. His mug shot showed a totally bald, short man with glasses. He was wearing a badly fitted suit and had a tie with ‘Bugs Bunny’ on. He had been arrested for being part of an illegal gambling game in North London . His financial records showed his love of gambling. I wondered if that is how Tony had got him into his organisation. I sniggered out loud at his tie and Mac did that annoying ‘eyebrow lifting thing’ again. He was unmarried and lived alone in one of the rougher areas in London . He had no secret accounts but his debt which was around the £50000 mark. It definitely gave him motive to steal from Tony.

I pulled out the third folder and it showed thug number one, Mike Smith. I recognised him as the guy who had twisted my arm around my back when I was snatched in front of the police station. His record was a long one. He had spent two years in prison for extortion and aggravated assault. His charges for other thuggery had been dropped when the witnesses had either disappeared or refused to testify against him. He was also unmarried (big surprise there). He was built like a brick wall with huge shoulders and even bigger biceps covered in tattoos. His face looked mean and he had a broken nose and a knife shaped scar at his throat. His pale blue eyes looked dead in the photo. You could almost sense the menace coming off the mug shot. His vices included betting on dog races and doing whatever Tony wanted. From the report he was suspected of extorting protection money off shop keepers in the West and East Ends of London. Busy guy!

I pulled out the fourth folder feeling a bit of a headache coming on. It was a lot of information to take in on one sitting. Joseph Terry was the other thug from the van. He had lank greasy black hair put up into some kind of quiff thing. He had on a really nice blue suit and black tie. His moniker was Pretty Boy. I didn’t see it. He had nice brown eyes and a relatively attractive face for a psychopath. He was from Liverpool and had a wife and two kids up there who he’d abandoned. His record included assault, theft, extortion, illegal gambling and selling drugs. He had two girlfriends set up in different apartments. He was Mike Smith’s partner and they were seen everywhere together. I assumed he went with Mike Smith to extort the money. No offshore accounts or anything.

I turned to Mac, “Alright, so according to Tony these were the only people apart from his missing mistress and the dead guy who were in on the scheme?”

“Yes, we go into his club tonight and interview the other three. I’m going in as an investor for a new club he wants to open in the West End . You will be my girlfriend. I want you to be there when we speak to Tony and the accountant. When I’m interviewing Joseph Terry and Mike Smith, I want you to check out the club. You’ll be carrying this on you” he paused and handed me a hair clip with a pretty gemstone in it. “It has a video camera and mike setup in it. I want you to walk around the club and catch everything you can. Don’t talk to anyone! If you see a person of interest just hang around them and it will pick up the conversation. We’ll then use the footage to give to Kyrial. He’ll get us folders of information set up like these ones” he said pointing at the folders on the table.

I decided to retreat to his car and flopped as ladylike as I could wearing a barely there tight dress.

“Look before we go, I want you to make sure your bug is working. He had activated it and made a call to someone. I tuned out of the conversation breathing in deeply to calm myself. My stomach was squirming with nerves. I checked my neckline just to ensure I wasn’t popping out of the dress when Mac started laughing hysterically.

“What’s so funny?” I asked.

“George says you have a nice rack” he said smirking. My breasts were nicely helped along by a ‘Wonder bra’. They had shrunk as my exercise routine had kicked in during dad’s sickness so they needed all the help they could get.

“Well George, can feck right off” I mumbled. Mac started laughing louder into his phone. I took this to mean my audio equipment was working correctly. My mind was full of dirty minded double entendres today.

I had deviously switched off my GPS tracked mobile phone earlier and stashed it in my boot before Mac got there. We got into Mac’s car and waved bye to Sherry. I blew her a kiss and winked as we sped off towards the club.